| A-K. Skeletons in position as buried. | |
| O. Cremated remains. | Y. Band of blue clay impervious to water. |
| W. Inner mound of clay. | Z. Outer mound of chalk. |
| X. Bed of chalk grit. | * Probable summit of the barrow when built. |
From the diagram we see that the bodies first interred have been placed at the bottom of a cavity dug out of the solid chalk. This hole not proving large enough for the numbers to be buried, an extension has been begun, but not finished. Time was evidently pressing, for some bodies have been buried above the surface of the ground. They have been placed in different positions, but the legs of all have been bent at the knees and all are enclosed in a low mound of clay. Above this lie the remains of numerous other bodies, which have been burnt before burial; and over them comes a twelve-inch layer of a blue clay which is impervious to water. Then a large mound of soil and pieces of chalk has been raised over all, the mound being originally much higher than it is to-day.
Such has been the building of Howe Hill. But it must not be thought that all barrows contain the remains of a large number of bodies. Most contain one only, and the body has either been buried as it was when life left it or been burnt and the calcined bones gathered up in an earthenware vessel, or pinned in a skin garment. The eight full-grown skeletons discovered under Howe Hill are those of men, and we may suppose that they represent a chieftain and his relatives killed in the onslaught by a hostile clan. The cremated bodies, forty of which were discovered in the digging of a trench through the barrow, would be those of his dependants, who died fighting in defence of their lord and master.
But the barrow contains evidence of the lives of the people of the time as well as of their deaths. Scattered through the soil under the band of blue clay were found many broken bones of the ox, roebuck, red deer, fox, goat, and pig, the remains of the burial feast; and among these were human bones which had quite evidently been broken and cooked. It is horrible to think of the people of our East Riding as having once been cannibals, but the evidence to that effect is indisputable.
Here and there were also found portions of the weapons with which the defenders of the settlement had fought—the hammer head shown on page [9], made from the shed antler of a red deer, and the broken javelin head of flint shown on page [15]. In this barrow was also found the wonderfully made flint knife represented below—an implement fashioned out of a piece of flint with no other tools than such as are mentioned below, and yet fashioned so delicately that its greatest thickness is only one-sixteenth of an inch.
Polished Flint Knife found in Duggleby
Howe (1/1).
A clever workman he must have been who made this wonderful knife. But such beautifully wrought implements are very rare. Only one similar knife—found in a barrow at Aldro—was known to its discoverer, and he had himself superintended the excavation of no fewer than two hundred and eighty-eight barrows.
The weapons and tools which have been buried with their owners are more commonly of the rougher types figured on the opposite page. They include knives, chisels, spear heads, saws, and arrow heads, all made from flints by the processes of chipping and flaking, with hammer heads, picks, needles and daggers of bone.